


Hiemal Solstice

by KrisseyCrystal (IceCreAMS)



Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo [13]
Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Creatures & Monsters, Alternate Universe - Monster Hunters, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, F/M, Fae & Fairies, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, Magic, Sexual Assault
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-04
Updated: 2020-04-04
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:53:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23484130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IceCreAMS/pseuds/KrisseyCrystal
Summary: Steven also really, really, really wishes that Sapphire and Ruby had told him and Connie just a little bit more information about the creature they had traveled all the way to the big city to find.
Relationships: Connie Maheswaran/Steven Universe
Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1648339
Comments: 6
Kudos: 35
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo





	Hiemal Solstice

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MoominQuartz (IceCreAMS)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/IceCreAMS/gifts), [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



> I HAVE TOO MANY NOTES so i'm gonna break them up; put some at the beginning and end 
> 
> FIRST & FOREMOST please pay attention to the tags!! take care of yourselves!! there IS attempted rape & sexual assault of a minor in this fic (Steven is 16), so tread carefully! If you want to skip to the comfort stuff, jump to the part halfway through that starts with "They know it’s him by the Scream."
> 
> read with care!

Steven stares at the ceiling. 

He blinks once. 

He blinks again. 

No matter how many times he tries, it doesn’t get any more familiar. The rapid-fire of his breath in and out of his lungs has long since calmed down the longer he’s been awake and nothing has happened. The initial panic he woke under ebbed. In its place lies only confusion. His brows slowly draw downward, pinching the sweat beaded along his temple. He can’t recall how in all the realms he ended up here. 

Wherever here is.

He probably shouldn’t be surprised he’s in an abandoned warehouse. Last Steven remembers, he and the others had been going after a creature that liked to stalk the shadowed alleys of Empire City and if there’s anything Steven has learned on all of their adventures, it’s that preying creatures favor forgotten, out-of-the-way locations to subdue their hunts.

Steven only wishes he knew what it was that was, apparently, trying to hunt _him._

He pulls on the cuffs once more, then twice. He really, _really_ wishes his nose would stop itching. He also really, really, _really_ wishes that Sapphire and Ruby had told him and Connie just a _little bit_ more information about the creature they had traveled all the way to the big city to find. For some reason, as soon as they visited the place where the first victim had been attacked, they told Garnet to take Steven and Connie back to the hotel immediately.

Steven’s still not sure why. It’s not like he got to see anything from the crime scene. The only thing he _is_ sure of is that he trusts Ruby and Sapphire. Completely.

He just…wishes they would have clued him in to what’s going on and what they’re hunting, if they figured it out.

_Might make this situation a little easier to deal with._

Steven huffs. He tests the restraints once more and then closes his eyes. 

_Okay. Think, Steven. Think! Maybe if you bubble--_

The door at the far end of the warehouse swings open with a grating whine.

“Hello there, dearie. Are you awake?”

Steven has never heard that voice before. It’s polished and high; accented. It would be pleasant to listen to if Steven was listening to it under a context that was different than being chained to a seedy bed at the back of an abandoned warehouse.

“Uh,” he calls back, trying to crane his head and peer around his own body. “Yes?”

“My! You’re quite earnest, aren’t you,” the woman tut’s. Heels clack across dusty concrete. “Of course, I knew that was the case when I first saw you. Normally, I don’t go after the littler ones, but dare I say, there was something _special_ about you…”

“Th…thank you?” 

The heels stop at the corner of his bed. Steven blinks up at the woman, who is everything he was _not_ expecting--and yet, at the same time, everything he was fearfully anticipating.

“So I take it you’re a fan of the Victorian era, huh?” He swallows.

The woman chuckles. The ends of her painted-scarlet lips curl. She swings her fan once, then twice. Tendrils of her vibrant red hair hanging loose from her up-do sway in the breeze. “Well, well, well. I’m impressed. Usually my victims don’t try to start a conversation with me. Their demands tend to be very simple and by that measure, completely pointless.”

Steven laughs, but it feels weak and far too anxious to be convincing. Is she being flattering? Or demeaning? And what does that mean for him if none of her other victims have been able to talk their way into her mercy? “What can I say? I’m…uh…a talkative guy?”

“Charming.” Her fan snaps shut. “Still, ultimately annoying. Hmm…”

Steven doesn’t know what that means, either. “I can be quiet if you want?”

“Oh, would you?” The woman’s painted features brighten. Carefully, she steps around the bed and drops her fan on a surface nearby. Steven can’t get his neck to bend far enough for him to see if it’s an end table or what. “That would be just perfect. I would hate to have to gag you. I think it just looks awful when I do that.”

“I--” Steven…also doesn’t know what to say to that. “--I think…I’d rather not be gagged, either.”

The woman tsks. She turns her back to him.

Something about the movement makes his stomach swoop in a bad, bad way. 

“What did we just say about not talking, dearie?”

“Uh, right.”

_…shit. How do I get out, now? Bubble now? I should bubble now, huh?_

“What’s your name?” he asks instead.

The woman freezes. Whatever she was doing at the table stops. Slowly, she turns to him. Her eyes are wide in a way that reminds him of Amethyst when she looks at Pearl and says, “Yo, what the fuck?” The way this woman’s red, red, red smile splits her face is more than a little disconcerting. Steven feels a little too exposed under that stare. “You don’t follow your own initiative very well, do you?”

Oh.

“In my defense,” Steven says and tries not to stammer. His heart is pounding hard in his chest. “I did say I was a talkative guy.”

She hums. “You may call me ‘Pyrope’ if you wish.”

“Cool. I’m Steven.”

“Hah! Do you think by giving me your name that means I’ll be less likely to take what I want from you?”

There’s--something else there, too. Something in between her words that has sweat pooling at the back of Steven’s shirt. He doesn’t like this. At all. He doesn’t like what he thinks that means. He doesn’t like any of this. 

He thinks he’s been feeling sick this entire time. The only difference is that now, it lurches in his gut with a lopsided surge, making itself painfully known. “I…hope so?”

Slowly, the woman leans over him. Her knee slips forward, out from under a high-rising slit in her wide skirts. The old mattress dips under the pressure of her weight. Steven has willingly not paid attention to her chest and its low-cut corset until it’s forcibly hanging over him. On her collar, he can see a curving, tattooed symbol that he doesn’t recognize. Not until his eyes drift up and he sees what’s holding up her hair are two, curving, red horns.

She touches his cheek. 

Steven flinches.

“I think hope is a bit beyond you now, dearie.”

Steven’s mind clicks into place the piece he’s missing almost a second too-late. There was a reason, after all, that Sapphire and Ruby had been so insistent he and Connie not be involved in the hunt for this creature. There was a reason they told Garnet to babysit them and to wait while they, Pearl, and Amethyst pursued it.

_A succubus._

Steven wants to pull back into the bed. He knows the stories. He’s familiar with the lore. He wants to melt, now; he wants to disappear, be anywhere but there, on that bed, with her body over his. 

He kind of wants to cry.

“Don’t.”

Pyrope pauses, mouth hovering inches from Steven’s own. She raises an eyebrow. “Don’t?” she repeats and chuckles. Her hand drifts from his cheek. A finger touches his lips and Steven jerks his head to the side. Hard, cold fingers grab his chin and turn him to face her again. “Now you’re beginning to sound just like all the others.”

Steven grasps for words that won’t come. Did her other victims feel this terrified? They had every right to be. “S-stop.”

“Stop what? I’m not doing anything right now.”

“I want it to stay that way.”

“Ah. And there’s the good humor you showed before. I do like that. It’s why I’m being merciful, even though I thought you _agreed_ you would keep quiet for me.” She taps her finger against his lips once, then twice. 

“I don’t--” Steven’s breath stutters out of him. He could bubble, couldn’t he? Why isn’t he bubbling? He blinks hard. “--I’ve changed my mind. I don’t…I don’t think I’ll be able to keep quiet. C-could…could you please let me go?”

The humoring smile on Pyrope’s face fades. “And now he’s afraid.”

Was he _not_ supposed to be, somehow?!

Steven wants to shout. He wants to scream those words out until his chest bursts. But he squeezes his eyes shut tight and settles for trying to get as much air into his lungs as he can instead--all the oxygen he can muster--and all only to barely whisper back, “Of _course_ I am. I don’t--I don’t want this. Please.”

“Unfortunately, dearie…”

Steven’s stomach swoops into _bad bad bad_ as he feels the swing of her weight over him. He is very conscious of the unwanted pressure of her thighs on either side of his waist. 

He doesn’t want to open his eyes. He doesn’t want to open his eyes.

He doesn’t want to open his eyes.

“It doesn’t very much matter to me what _you_ want.” 

Something has been unlaced. There’s a shift of cloth. When it falls, it lands on his stomach, sitting warmly until it is pulled away. 

Panic lights in his chest. 

It builds behind his closed eyes like sparks. He fists his hands. Something is screaming up and out from within the marrow of his bones. It gathers on pins at the apex of his shoulder blades like fire. 

“See, there’s something you humans have that I need…” 

“Don’t touch me.”

Pyrope’s fingers tug up on his shirt. 

Steven thrashes against the bed. He pulls on his restraints. The chain links clink against one another and whine. The bedposts groan and jerk. They bend--something’s _got_ to be bending, but yet it refuses to give. He can’t lift his knees, though he tries and he tries and he tries as his shirt is being lifted. It bunches up to his chest. Cold fingers dance across his middle. She _is touching his skin_ and he can’t--

“Don’t _touch me!”_

She is close to his face. 

“Don’t!”

He smells her breath. He has never hated anything more. Her cheek is pressed to his; her mouth close to his ear. Their bodies are very close now.

“Shh. It’s fine, dearie. I’ll make it quick--”

“--no, please! Stop--”

She touches his belt. 

_“--NO!”_

A Scream unleashes up his throat.

The world erupts into pink.

* * *

It is quiet in the afterwards.

Old ceiling panels of the dilapidated warehouse have crashed to the floor. Cracks spider-web out through the concrete from the spiked bubble sitting in the middle of the remains of the bed, encircling Steven. His hands are fisted in each opposite sleeve of his shirt. His knees are pulled to his chest. The broken ends of what were once his binding chains dangle off the cuffs around his wrists and ankles.

His eyes are not human as they stare at the succubus and the succubus, several yards away, half-laying on the ground, stares back.

“ _Fuil na Banríona_ ,” Pyrope whispers. A cut along her cheek bleeds sluggish silver. “ _Logh dom, mo bhréag. Ní raibh a fhios agam_ …”

Steven chokes on a sob. He shakes his head and shakes his head and shakes his head. He can’t get enough breath in. His lungs are heaving; they are doing their best, gasping over and over again to fill themselves with air, but it doesn’t work.

Steven bows his head to his knees. His hands fist tighter in his sleeves.

He does not see Pyrope as she scurries away.

He does not think he cares to know where she has gone.

* * *

They know it’s him by the Scream. 

Connie’s not sure what it is, exactly, that she hears. They are out on the streets, looking everywhere for where Steven could have gone--or worse, been taken _to._ The others seem far more keen to the sound that erupts in the distance, but she snaps straight when the ground underneath her shakes. Something crumbles far-away. There’s a ripple in the magic of the midnight air and Connie half-sees it, half-doesn’t: the strange, gossamer veneer; a momentary borealis.

She snaps her head up and Garnet freezes, staring off in the exact same place Sapphire’s gaze leads.

Sapphire gasps. Her hand does an odd half-flutter to her face before it bunches into a fist in her skirts. “Oh no…”

Ruby and Amethyst run.

Connie books it on their heels. Garnet keeps pace with her at her side, shouting directions. Her booming voice almost drowns out the worried murmurings between Pearl and Sapphire behind them. Connie doesn’t know what to think about their exchange of: “Did you see him?” and “I can see him now. I couldn’t before. There must have been wards put in place. Pearl, what if she…?” 

They round corner after corner.

Then Garnet shouts, “There!” and thrusts her finger towards a warehouse with pieces of its roof sunken in. Long cracks in the concrete extend out from within its walls. 

Amethyst pushes ahead of them all, yelling, “I see him! He’s okay! Steven!” and at the cry, Connie’s heart melts for a half-second of reprieving relief. Then it jumps up high in her throat, snatched with worry, as soon as she sees the spiked, jagged pink bubble that surrounds Steven’s huddled form.

Connie has never seen his signature barrier look quite so...not-bubbly before.

The usual perfect sphere has facets. Jagged, uneven, asymmetrical faces that shimmer under the moonlight through gaps in the roof, making it look like a jeweled boulder. 

Amethyst has her hands carefully pressed to the closest side, between two spikes. “Steven!” she shouts. “It’s us! We’re here! You’re okay, buddy! We’ve got you, now! It’s gonna be fine!”

Connie takes big gulps of air at Amethyst’s shoulder. She watches Ruby and Garnet as they investigate the perimeter, murmuring quietly to each other. She thinks they’re looking for the creature that kidnapped him, unless maybe it wasn’t a creature at all? Connie’s not sure. She’s been kept out of the loop for this one, right up until the moment Steven didn’t return to their hotel room with their ordered take-out.

Pearl joins Connie’s side, eclipsing her view of Ruby and Garnet. Connie follows her swimming, light blue gaze to Steven, still sitting in his self-made bubble, if she can even call it that.

Steven slowly lifts his head from his knees. 

Connie stifles a gasp. A thread of fear darts down her spine; she hates it as soon as she feels it. “Steven…” 

Steven’s frightening eyes blink once and slowly. He takes a single deep, shaky breath. Almost as if he is waking up from a bad sleep, he murmurs, “A-Amethyst? Connie? Pearl?”

“Yes! We’re here, Steven!” Pearl says and presses her hand to a pink spike. “It’s okay.”

Steven blinks hard again. And again. His labored breath hitches as slowly, his shield begins to break apart. When Connie next sees his eyes, they are free from under the glowing light of his barrier. Steven looks at them with normal, human brown. He looks to Pearl and rasps her name and Pearl jerks forward, as if tugged by an invisible string.

“Yes. Yes, I’m here, Steven,” Pearl says again. She falls to her knees at his side. 

Connie moves to follow, but nearly trips. When she looks down to the toes of her hastily-tied converse, she sees the bent feet, steel rim, and ripped-apart mattress of what was once a crummy old bed. 

There’s a broken cuff wrapped around the bedpost.

Connie’s eyes follow the rough sound of jingling until she sees Steven’s reddened ankles and wrists.

Amethyst is already sitting at Steven’s other side. When Steven sags against Pearl’s shoulder, Pearl doesn’t hesitate. Her thin, white arms snatch around him. Her fingers weave into his dark curls. Immediately, whatever was holding Steven upright deflates. He hides in Pearl, turning his face into her neck. Amethyst hovers at his back. After a moment, she shares a bitten-lip glance with Connie.

Connie does not miss the way Steven’s crossed hands never unfist from the bottom hem of his shirt. 

* * *

“Garnet?”

“Hm.” 

Connie takes a breath. She glances back at the couch, where Steven has long since fallen asleep with his head resting against Amethyst’s furred side. Amethyst lies curled around him protectively in wolf form; her tail rests gently over his shoulder.

Her eyes fall on the tried tear-tracks on Steven’s wan face. 

She turns back to Garnet and swallows. “Do you know what happened to him?”

Garnet presses her lips together. 

The silence is its own beast, Connie thinks; something else to be afraid of, now, other than the selfish, stalking creatures of shadows.

When they had returned to the hotel room, Sapphire had known Ruby would be angry; she had known her lover wouldn’t be able to keep her silence and be still, that the first words out of her mouth would be, “This is all my fault.” The two left almost as soon as they had all arrived, hoping to track down the creature that did this. In their absence, the only other sound Connie can hear is Pearl in the kitchen, wrapping Steven’s untouched sweet and sour chicken and setting it in the fridge.

Garnet sighs after a moment. “If you’re asking, then you already have some idea.”

Connie doesn’t like the way her gut twists. She clasps her hands in front of her stomach in an effort to give them something to do so they don’t shred anything to ruins. 

“The important thing is: he _will_ be okay.”

Connie isn’t aware that she is so close to crying until she blinks to look at Garnet and finds the world swimming, distorting. 

Garnet’s hand is warm on her shoulder. When she bends to one knee, she does the courtesy of pulling off her ever-present shades, revealing equally wet eyes of deep red and bright blue. “He doesn’t need us reminding him that he has experienced something horrible. He will be thinking of that enough himself. We should be here for him in every way we can to help lift it.”

“How?”

“Remind him that he _will_ be okay, especially when he can’t think that for himself.”

Connie takes a breath. It’s shaky and uncertain, but she nods. Her eyes glance to the clock behind Garnet and Pearl, still in the kitchen. How could it only now be two in the morning? This night has stretched on long enough already.

“Get some rest,” Garnet murmurs. Her hand lifts from Connie’s shoulder to rest against the top of her head. “Tomorrow is another day, one which some of us will spend a majority of on the road back to Beach City as soon as possible.”

Is it selfish for Connie to admit how relieving that is to hear?

* * *

Steven stares at the ceiling. 

He blinks once. 

He blinks again. 

It is the little things that are comforting, he thinks. Such as: no matter how many times he tries, the popcorn-white that spans one corner of the ceiling to the other doesn’t change. Why do hotel rooms never have a light fixture on their ceilings, he’s always wondered? There are only standing lamps and the noodle-necked ones that bend over your face on the bedside table. Is it to conserve energy?

He turns his head, trying not to wake Amethyst. The clock on her phone reads 5:57. It is still dark beyond the drawn curtains, but pinkening. It is not as heavy and thick.

Steven curls under his blanket further, tugging the edge up over his shoulder.

The door to the bedroom opens. 

Connie tip-toes out. 

Steven doesn’t move.

Connie stares back. Her hands fist at her sides. Her eyes dart from the door of the bathroom to Steven and back and after a moment, she pads over on socked feet to the couch.

Steven’s chest does something funky as he watches. It twists and sharpens; it draws a short gasp out of him he has no control over. 

Connie freezes. 

Quickly, Steven shakes his head. He lifts his eyes, but when Amethyst doesn’t move or twitch, he looks to Connie again. _Sorry,_ he mouths.

Connie shakes her head. She shakes her head and shakes her head and shakes her head, fisted hands rising to either side of her chest. As fast as she can, she tip-toes to the couch and kneels at his side. Steven’s eyes follow her every movement. 

Connie presses her hands to the edge of the cushion to whisper, “You have nothing to apologize for, silly.”

A small, crooked smile spreads across Steven’s face. “I’m really glad to see you,” he whispers back. 

“M-me too.” Connie takes a breath. Seeing the growing shine in Steven’s eyes makes her own eyes water reflexively. Her fingers tighten against the cushion’s seam. “You didn’t sleep for very long.”

“Neither did you.”

“Yeah, well…” Connie’s eyes dart to the side. Amethyst still hasn’t moved. She’s always been a heavy sleeper, but she knows Amethyst has mentioned before how her wolf form augments her senses. “Um, Garnet said some of us may be heading back to Beach City tomorrow. I figure we can sleep on the ride there if nothing else.”

Steven’s eyebrows lift. “R…really? We’re going back home?”

“Yeah?”

“But we didn’t stop…”

“She said some of us. I think whoever stays is going to try to catch that--” Connie’s voice hitches on the word. Her eyes meet Steven’s. “--thing.”

Steven looks away.

“Sorry.” Connie swallows. “M-maybe I shouldn’t have…”

Steven’s gaze shifts to look at something else, something else that also still isn’t Connie. Connie feels painfully aware of this; she wonders if she pushed too hard. “No,” he whispers past a tight throat. “It’s fine. It’s not like…I mean, nothing _happened._ I know it probably looks like--like she--it looks bad, right? I’ve been acting like a baby ever since we got back which doesn’t help things, but it’s fine. I don’t want you and the others to get the wrong idea. She didn’t…nothing actually--” 

“--Steven--”

“--nothing _happened._ ”

“But something _did_ happen!” Connie slaps a hand over her mouth and glances to Amethyst’s face. A pointed ear flicks, twitches. When nothing more happens, her hand falls away. “It doesn’t have to be _worse_ for it to have still been _awful_ , Steven. None of that should have _ever_ happened.”

Steven’s lips turn bleach white from the thin line they are pressed into. His eyebrows furrow.

His next breath stutters on its way in and out.

“Is it pathetic that I’m so, so relieved about going home?” he whispers. “I should stay and help, I know I should, but all I want is my Dad.”

“That’s not pathetic,” Connie promises. 

Steven’s breath hitches again. “I can’t stop thinking about Mom, too. Isn’t that weird? It’s like the _worst time_ to think about her. But I can’t help wondering like, if _she_ were here…would that have still happened? Or would she have protected me? Would she be angry to know that wherever she’s gone, in her absence, _this_ happened to her son? Or almost happened? Would she care? Does she care? Does she know--” Steven tightens his face and presses a hand to cover it. “--ugh! It--it doesn’t make sense. I know it doesn’t. It’s not her fault. B-but sometimes I--I wonder if she were here--” 

“--oh, Steven…”

Steven presses both hands to his face to hide the sob that wrenches out of him. 

Connie puts her hand on his shoulder, over the blanket, and squeezes.

She stays with him, holding him through that one point of contact, until the first rays of morning spill in through the break between the curtains.

**Author's Note:**

> so alksjdlfkjaf i villainized pyrope (from "unleash the light") much more than she is in canon but uh...if there was anyone who was gonna be an evil succubus, it'd be her let's be real
> 
> my wonderful, genius husband (moominquartz) has this AMAZING Feyfolk & Fiends AU i'm sure you've all seen and if you hAVEN'T like LITERALLY GO READ THE OTHER FICS IN THE SERIES RIGHT NOW IT'S MY FAVORITE. so when i first took up a vaguely-worded challenge to complete the "chained to a bed" prompt (from my [bad things happen bingo card](https://krisseycrystal.tumblr.com/post/614506481404002304/rated-m-fandom-steven-universe-prompt-chained)) i wasn't sure how it would fit the steven universe canon...until this gem of an au existed.
> 
> i asked him if i could write a thing for it and he agreed. i owe him everything
> 
> also, i'm so sorry for the super-extra title, but since all of this takes place in a single night, i wanted to encapsulate how long that span of time can feel especially when something so jarring happens. "Heimal Solstice" is another name for the "Winter Solstice" which, as we all know, has the longest night of the year


End file.
